120++ Quotes from John Ellis “Jeb” Bush

John Ellis “Jeb” Bush (born February 11, 1953) is an American businessman and politician who served as the 43rd Governor of Florida from 1999 to 2007. Bush is the second son of former President George H. W. Bush and former First Lady Barbara Bush, a brother of former President George W. Bush, and grandson of the late Senator Prescott Sheldon Bush. He grew up in Houston, Texas.

Jeb graduated from Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts and attended the University of Texas, where he earned a degree in Latin American affairs. Following his father’s successful run for Vice President in 1980, he moved to Florida and pursued a career in real estate development. In 1986, Bush was named Florida’s Secretary of Commerce, a position he held until his resignation in 1988 to help his father’s successful campaign for the Presidency. Now, he run for his own presidency. His rival in Republic candidacy include, Donald Trump, Ted Cruz and Ben Carson.

Here are 120 Quotes From “Jeb” Bush:

Jeb Bush Quotes About Big Issues

It’s important to build trust if you’re trying to deal with big things. Big issues require everybody to get outside their comfort zone, and people are more willing to do so if they believe that their partner is sincere in their efforts. And the only way you can do that is to engage them on a personal level.

Our children can achieve great things when we set high expectations for them.

We awoke one morning in September, and the world lurched on its axis.

I think Republicans really need to be disciplined, to stay focused on sustained economic growth.

Life teaches you that you need to make decisions in the right time – not too early, not too late.

When businesses go through hard times, through down markets, what do they do is they challenge every basic assumption of how they operate. They innovate. They create disruption for a while that leads them to even greater heights when the economy turns around.

It’s been painful to see the people that you love be attacked when you know it’s not fair or true.

Well, I think lower taxes and less regulation would actually promote growth.

Public education must be viewed from the lens of providing each child with the learning environment that best meets his or her needs. If we can send a low-income child to a parochial school, knowing that his odds of attending college will increase as a result, then that should be our mission.

I don’t think a party can aspire to be the majority party if it’s the old white guy party.

Jeb Bush Quotes About Marriage

Traditional marriage is what should be sanctioned.

Being against other people’s policies eventually puts you in a downward spiral. It’s fine to be principled and oppose views that you don’t agree with, but you also have to have an alternative.

Florida has its own rhythm, too. People go to work, they watch their children learn and grow and start families of their own. They play in the sun and pass their lives enjoying the outsized blessings that make our state unique.

I believe that the great majority of people coming here illegally have no other option. They want to provide for their family. But we need to control our border.

But without a caring society, without each citizen voluntarily accepting the weight of responsibility, government is destined to grow even larger, taking more of your money, burrowing deeper into your lives.

Who among us has never looked up into the heavens on a starlit night, lost in wonder at the vastness of space and the beauty of the stars?

I really think that elected officials should be focused on how you create sustained economic growth, how do you create jobs and all of these issues that made people – segments of our society believe are really important are diversions politically.

A four percent growth strategy means you fix a convoluted tax code. You get in and you change every aspect of regulations that are job killers. You get rid of Obamacare and replace it with something that doesn’t suppress wages and kill jobs.

Florida is a place of unparalleled diversity of backgrounds, experiences and vision. It makes our culture unique, but it can also make it difficult to define a common identity and create a sense of community that reaches beyond our neighborhoods to all corners of our state.

There’s a whole lot of America that looks at each other and says, ‘Well, there’s 340 million people living in America. Isn’t there somebody other than a Bush or a Clinton who can be president in these modern times?’

There’s a fine line between stubbornness and the positive side of that, which is dogged determination.

Jeb Bush Quotes About Border

Great countries need to secure their border for national security purposes, for economic purposes and for rule of law purposes.

I don’t know if I’m a national education figure.

Leaders lead. They don’t divide; they don’t create a climate that is poisonous.

You have to maintain your principles but have a broader appeal.

As governor, I saw the link between economic prosperity and the ability to acquire knowledge.

I would say national security is work in progress.

I have never wavered from my intention to advance the cause of diversity in new and more effective ways.

Everything’s viewed with a political lens in Washington, and that’s just the nature of the beast, and it is what it is.

I’ve never heard anybody in my family say anything but good things about Rick Perry.

Low standards are a tactic that takes pressure off teachers’ unions by accepting mediocrity and failure for kids.

Jeb Bush Quotes About Complex Problems

I’d be wary of simple solutions to complex problems.

It’s a complex relationship when your dad happened to be president and you are president and then you have all the amateur psychology that goes on when people try to speculate about motivations.

We are stronger because we recognize that government isn’t the sole answer to the most important questions, and we welcome community and faith based organizations as partners to serve the needs of Florida families.

I reject the notion that a high turnout helps Senator Kerry. I think in Florida at least, it’s going to help PresidentBush because we have gotten more registered voters than the Democrats, and our base is just fired up – thanks to your help and a lot of others.

Any time an elected official in the world we’re in today that appears so dysfunctional challenges a core constituency not of their opponent but of their own political base, I think we should pause and give them credit.

If you believe, like I do, that the world is abundant with possibilities, then we need to make sure we build capacity so that everybody is successful or can be successful in the pursuit of their dreams – not the dreams of someone from government, but their own dreams.

If you could bring to me a majority of people to say that we’re going to have $10 of spending cuts for $1 of revenue enhancement, put me in, coach.

I don’t believe you outsource your convictions and principles to people.

I’m happy to be helping people that are passionate about empowering parents for student learning.

There are people who believe in expanding the welfare state across the spectrum of races and ethnicities and creeds.

You focus on the things that you can control, and that’s what I’m doing.

If you set a tone that you don’t want people to be part of your team, they don’t join.

Jeb Bush Quotes About Teachers

Teachers make a difference, and we would serve our students better by focusing on attracting and retaining the quality teachers by raising teacher pay.

I acted on my core beliefs on social issues as governor.

I don’t wake up each morning saying, ‘Oh, wow, it’s me. I think I’m the cat’s meow. I’m the best.’

I think life is precious from beginning to end.

I’ve always believed that if you support reform or you support a particular idea that you ought to fund that idea first and not the system.

If you have to deal with our friends at ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, it’s like a Kafka novel. Files just disappear.

Immigrants create an engine of economic prosperity.

My guess is my brother would call his mom and his dad pretty regularly, a lot more than I probably did.

The Common Core State Standards are more rigorous standards than the great majority of states had in place previously.

Apparently there are some Democratic leaders in the Senate that are running for office who now believe in tax cuts.

Candidates are making lasting impressions on voters, not just primary voters, in how they campaign.

Jeb Bush Quotes About Academic Standard

I support high academic standards. Period.

I was blessed to have a mother and father that recognized the value of education.

I’ve been so blessed to be part of a family that has dedicated its life to public service.

Immigrants are more fertile.

The GOP should be the GSP: the Grand Solutions Party. It should be about solutions, not talking points.

There’s a lot of obsession about people’s personal ambitions.

Treating people fairly and with civility is not a bad thing… It would be good for our country if political leaders actually took that to heart.

Way too many people believe Republicans are anti-immigrant, anti-woman, anti-science, anti-gay, anti-worker.

We have a wealth of talent in the Republican Party.

I’m getting nervous to be called a centrist. Breaking out in a rash.

Jeb Bush Quotes About Family Life

It’s really important to recognize that family life in America has changed pretty dramatically.

Right now people seem to be very tentative about the positive benefits of capitalism.

If you had to pick the values that would be held dear to a broad number of Hispanic voters, access to opportunity would be a higher value than guarantee of security, particularly amongst the newly arrived, meaning the last 20 years.

States are free to modify the Common Core State Standards or adopt their own individual standards, because academic standards are the prerogative of the states.

Clearly if the United States’ relationship with Cuba changed, which would require a regime change inside Cuba, if

Cuba moved towards a more democratic approach to governance rather than this despotic rule of tyranny, if they moved towards the systems that have created more economic prosperity, then our immigration laws would change accordingly.

I envision presenting parents with a marketplace of school choices – public, private, parochial, charter, virtual, blended, and home education. They then can choose the model that best equips their children for success.

We need to end the government monopoly in education by transferring power from bureaucracies and unions to families. The era of defining public education as allegiance to centralized school districts must end.

I have a voice: I want to share my beliefs about how the conservative movement and the Republican party can regain its footing, because we’ve lost our way.

If we don’t empower families to be able to have a quality education, then their children – for the first time in American history, truly the first time – will not have the same economic opportunities

Never again can the Republican Party simply write off entire segments of our society because we assume our principles have limited appeal. They have broad appeal. We need to be larger than that.

Jeb Bush Quotes About His Thought

I have a blessed life in so many ways.

I think President Obama has used the bully pulpit as a way to attack capitalism.

I think the voters can make up their own minds.

I never felt comfortable with making political decisions based on whether, you know, it was the right thing to do in terms of a poll.

If more people were actively engaged in advocating their positions I think we’d have a better society.

I don’t miss politics.

I miss being governor.

I’m fairly accessible.

I do a lot of traveling overseas.

I get to advocate issues and ideas that I believe in.

I will support the Republican nominee.

My wife and I are living large in our beloved Miami and I’m working on the things that are important to me.

I have a blessed life.

I try to have my voice be heard, but not on a regular basis on TV.

I want my voice to have purpose.

I’m comfortable with the life I have.

People are moping around and I think campaigns can be about lifting the spirits of the American people.

I think it was hard at first for my dad to transition to being immobile.

I’m a conservative – a practicing one. I’m not a talk-about-it one.

Immigration is a gateway basically. It’s a check-off point for Latino voters.

It’s a volatile time.

If I can help create an environment where the principles that I believe in can be implemented – to me, that’s fulfilling.

Imagine Texas as a blue state: how hard it would be to carry the presidency or gain control of the Senate.

Immigration is as much about the American experience and the values we share, and a lot more about economics than it is about politics.

In a divided government, you can’t just say, ‘It’s my way or the highway.’

In Washington, particularly, the loyal opposition has a job to be the opposition. But you can’t stop there.

It’s hard to be a son of a candidate. It’s hard to be a brother of a candidate. I think it may be the hardest thing to be the dad of the candidate.

Jeb Bush Quotes About US Superiority

The fact that the U.S. is superior to all others allows for free commerce to take place.

There is no other country that has the Cuban Adjustment Act; that’s why it’s called the Cuban Adjustment Act and not the Nicaraguan Adjustment Act.

There’s a direct link between percentage of young people that are educated and how we live our lives.

We must return conservatives to the majority in the U.S. Senate.

We’ve created rules and taxes on top of every aspiration of people, and the net result is we’re not growing fast, income is not growing.

You have to remember that in a state like Florida, independent voters will decide the election.

You know, when you run you got to be all in and you take risks of winning and losing.

People with deep faith and big hearts are concerned, as I am about the circumstance that Ms. Schiavo is in. I want them to know I will do what I can, but there are limits to what any particular person – irrespective of the title they currently hold – can do.

Jeb Bush Quotes About Iraq

Barack Obama became president, and he abandoned Iraq. He left, and when he left Al Qaida was done for. ISIS was created because of the void that we left, and that void now exists as a caliphate the size of Indiana.

I am my own man. I governed as a conservative, and I govern effectively. And the net effect was, during my eight years, 1.3 million jobs were created. We left the state better off because I applied conservative principles in a purple state the right way, and people rose up.

I get tired of hearing people, well-meaning people, talking about African-American kids or Hispanic kids as if they’re all the same. Which isn’t true. There is a very diverse group of people in both groups in terms of income, objectives in life, aspirations, cultural wants, habits, all the things that make us unique Americans.

I had the chance to be governor for eight years and I took a year to transition out and a year to transition in, so that’s a decade of my life where I pursued my own ambitions and I thought it was time to rearrange my life to focus on other things.

I loved being governor. It was a blast. Eight years was enough. But it was certainly one of the greatest thrills in my life to be able to serve the people of Florida. I miss that from time to time.

I think my dad’s post-presidency, he didn’t miss a beat. He didn’t get into any kind of ‘Woe is me.’ He dusted himself off and led an incredible life since 1993.

If I decide to run for office again, it will be based on what I believe, and it will be based on my record. And that record was one of solving problems completely from a conservative prospective.

If I’m a conservative, I’ll generally watch Fox. If someone’s liberal, they’ll generally watch MSNBC. They’ll basically learn a set of facts that are completely distinct from one another. They’ll get their views validated.

If we are going to compete in this world we’re in today, there is no possible way we can do it with lowering expectations and dumbing down everything. Children are going to suffer, and families’ hearts are going to be broken that their kids won’t be able to get a job in the 21st Century.

My record as a pro-life governor is not in dispute. I am completely pro-life, and I believe that we should have a culture of life. It’s informed by my faith from beginning to end. And this not just as it related to unborn babies – I did it at the end of life issues as well. This is something that goes way beyond politics.

My wife is not a public person. She is uncomfortable with the limelight, which is why I love her. I don’t want a political wife – I want someone who, when I get home, I can have a normal life with.

Jeb Bush Quotes About Job Creation

Our economy grew at double the rate of the nation. We created 1.3 million jobs. We led the nation seven out of those eight years. We were only one of two states that went to AAA bond rating. I cut taxes, $19 billion. If you do that and apply conservative principles the right way, you create an environment where everybody rises up.

The dual effect of high growth creating higher income that’s taxed by government at all levels, combined with lessening demands placed on government that occurs during economic prosperity, is a worthy objective.

There are cultural reasons, economic competitiveness reasons. There are a lot of reasons why people are in poverty.

The difference today is that increasingly they are in perpetual poverty.

There should be a path to earned legal status for those that are here. Not – not amnesty – earned legal status, which means you pay a fine and do many things over an extended period of time.

We had rising student achievement across the board because high standards, robust accountability, ending social promotion in third grade, real school choice across the board, challenging the teachers union and beating them is the way to go.

You tell me which society is going to be the winner in this 21st Century: One that worries about how we feel or the one that worries about making sure that the next generation has the capacity to eat everybody’s lunch.